Shiny Red
by LobsterLobster
Summary: Jenny shows up at the precinct, but what is she really up to? Will Ichabod fall prey to her mischievous ideas? Ichabbie friendship/cuteness, tricksy Jenny, plus heavily implied Jenny/Irving pre-ship...What more could you want?


Shiny Red

Summary: Jenny shows up at the precinct, but what is she really up to? Will Ichabod fall prey to her mischievous ideas? (I'll give you a hint, the answer is yes!)

Ichabbie friendship/cuteness, tricksy Jenny, plus heavily implied Jenny/Irving pre-ship

A/N: I had this crazy idea the other day (my job is super boring) and it ended up as this. Enjoy!

…

Lieutenant Abbie Mills had been scheduled for patrol duty this morning. After everything she'd been through the past few weeks, it was actually a relief to head out on a routine patrol, driving slowly through the familiar streets of Sleepy Hollow.

Crane usually tagged along with her wherever she went, insisting that there were no such things as coincidences, not for them, but today he was conspicuously absent from her passenger seat. He had elected to instead stay behind. She'd left him sitting at her desk, absorbed in an old copy of Gulliver's Travels. He wanted to be alone and read, but still be in the office where he could hear immediately over the radio if anything happened to her.

He usually tried to hide it, but he was easier to read than he thought, and Abbie knew that he'd been feeling melancholy ever since the traumatic revelations they'd stumbled upon in the haunted mansion last week.

She pulled in to the station parking lot. Lunch at the diner always cheers him up. A nice warm slice of apple pie with a scoop of vanilla ice cream should do the trick.

Abbie walked in to the precinct. She was surprised to see the back of a familiar hoodie seated in the chair beside her small desk.

"Jenny! What are you doing here?"

Her sister and Crane were hunched over something on the desk between them. Jenny didn't hear her or, more likely, was ignoring her. Oh, this was going to be trouble.

"What are you doing?"

"Miss Mills," Ichabod finally looked up to greet her with a smile, "Look, your sister is kindly sharing her special talisman with me."

There were muffled snickers around the room as Ichabod held up his hand to show her. There it was; trouble in the form of a little bottle of bright red nail polish, the dripping brush held lightly between Jenny's fingers, the incongruent red sheen on the fingernails of her time-travelling Revolutionary War soldier.

"Oh _no_!" Abbie exclaimed, grabbing a surprised Ichabod's hand in horror, "No no no no!"

"What were you thinking?!" she hissed at Jenny.

"What's the matter?" Jenny looked up at her, too innocently, "He likes it."

Abbie groaned. She yanked on Ichabod's arm, trying to pull him up and out of the chair. "You, come with me!"

Confused by her reaction, Ichabod decided it was probably best to do as he was told and obeyed. Abbie pushed him into the nearest bathroom and marched right to the sink.

"Lieutenant! What is going on? Please explain!" Ichabod implored as Abbie turned on the faucet and held his hands under the water.

"I'm gone for barely three hours and you let Jenny paint your nails?" she asked rhetorically as she squirted a lot of foamy soap and tried to wipe the red polish from his nails. "It's not coming off…"

"This color is used to ward off demons and bad fortune. Miss Jenny learned of it on her travels around the world," Ichabod said, trying to clear up whatever this latest misunderstanding was. It felt disconcerting but not altogether unpleasant to let Abbie wash his hands like this.

"Oh, is that what she told you?"

Just then Captain Irving's secretary walked in to the bathroom. She gave an alarmed "Oh!" at the sight of the tall man leaning over the sink next to Lieutenant Mills and decided maybe it was best to come back later.

"Lieutenant!" Ichabod yanked his hand away from Abbie, who finally looked up at him, consternation all over his face, "I believe it is not socially acceptable for me, as a man, to be in the women's restroom!"

"Well, I have news for you Crane, it is generally not socially acceptable for men to wear sexy red nail polish either!" Abbie informed him. She couldn't help cracking a smile at the sheer absurdity of their situation. No, don't smile! How dare Jenny take advantage of him like this? And in front of an office full of people they had to see every day?

Ichabod looked up to see himself in the mirror as realization dawned.

"She lied to me," he stated.

"Yep," Abbie grabbed some paper towels and tried to wipe away the red polish but only managed to smear it around a bit, "Join the club."

"Is this permanent?" Ichabod asked, a touch of alarm creeping into his voice.

"No," she sighed, helpfully drying his hands off, which he could have done himself, "we just need to go get some acetone. Nail polish remover. It's not a problem."

"Okay," Ichabod agreed. "Let's get out of here!"

He led the way and abruptly shoved open the bathroom door, startling a young cadet who was about to enter. He walked quickly without looking back, trying to hide his embarrassment. Some choice words were to be had with the mischievous Jennifer Mills.

Captain Irving was already standing at Abbie's desk, talking to Jenny. Ichabod stopped short, causing Abbie to bump into his back. He stepped out of her way and, on second thought, thrust his hands deep into his pockets. Abbie rolled her eyes at him and continued towards her desk so Ichabod followed her, narrowing his eyes in a glare directed at Jenny.

Ichabod took in the scene before him. Miss Jenny was casually touching up the polish on her nails, acting like she had all the time in the world. She said something and smiled coyly up at Captain Irving, whose stern countenance faltered just a little, letting the hint of a smile tug at his features. Then he saw Miss Mills approach and was all business once again.

"Mills, I'm not running a daycare center here," Captain Irving jerked his head in Jenny's direction, "Get her out of here."

"Yes, sir," Abbie responded crisply.

Irving eyed Ichabod, who had his hands in his pockets like a petulant teenager and shifted his gaze away, hoping to avoid any undue attention. Irving walked back to his office, shaking his head in disbelief, wondering how his orderly precinct had descended so quickly into madness.

"You heard the man," Abbie put her hand on her hip and waited impatiently for her sister to cap her nail polish and get up, "Let's march!"

"Alright, alright. I'm coming," Jenny followed Ichabod and Abbie out of the office, blowing on her nails in an unconcerned manner as she walked.

Back outside the station, Abbie shivered against the cool autumn breeze and zipped her jacket up.

"What are you looking so smug about now?" she asked Ichabod, who had that glint in his eye again, like he knew something so clever and he was quite amused with himself.

Ichabod wheeled on Jenny, pointing a comically smudged finger at her face, "I know what you're doing here."

Jenny was startled, still unaccustomed to Ichabod's characteristic intensity, "What?"

"Don't you play coy with me. I saw everything that transpired back there," Ichabod stated.

"What's with him?" Jenny asked Abbie, incredulous.

"No, no," Abbie waved her hand dismissively at Jenny, "I want to hear this. Please, continue." She looked expectantly at her partner.

"You may have pulled one over on me, sure, but I didn't take long to figure out what you are really up to!" Ichabod leaned closer to Jenny, "It was written all over your face, plain as day." Maybe he was enjoying this a little too much.

"I don't know what you're talking about!" Jenny smacked his hand away from her face. She muttered, "And people say _I'm_ the crazy one."

"You chose to use sexy red nail paint because you're trying to catch a certain man's attention!" Ichabod proudly revealed.

Jenny stared at him incredulously, mouth agape, but no words made it out.

Abbie laughed out loud at the absurdity of hearing those words come out of Crane's mouth but the laugh quickly died as she tried to comprehend just what he meant by that. Jenny, her rebellious, taciturn, self-made freedom fighter/supernatural investigator sister was flirting with someone? Who could it be? It couldn't be Crane. Then who?

She replayed the whole scene from just a few minutes ago and a strange idea dawned on her.

"Noooo…" she said, disbelievingly, then alarmed, "No! You cannot be serious!"

"Is that all you can say today?" Jenny asked, mocking, "no, no, no!" in a petulant tone.

"Seriously, Abbie, I don't know where he'd getting this. It's nothing, really!" Jenny was determined to play it cool to the very end of the world, if need be.

"Then what are you doing here?"

"I came to ask you something, but you were out," Jenny said dismissively. "I got bored is all."

"What, you couldn't call me, or ask when I got home tonight?"

"I wanted to ask in person and I was in the area so I just stopped by. Clearly that was a mistake!" Jenny was by now seriously irritated at her sister's attitude. She crossed her arms and started to walk away, making for the sidewalk that leads downtown.

Abbie sighed. "Jenny, wait!" She ran to catch up with her and grabbed her arm, "Come on."

"It's nothing, don't worry about it," she kept walking, but slower.

"Jenny, just tell me. What were you going to ask me?" Abbie implored.

"Fine, Abbie," Jenny said, pushing a stray curl behind her ear, "I wanted to ask to borrow some money. I need a bike."

"A bike? That's it?" Abbie asked in a kinder voice. As frustrating as Jenny was, she knew it took a lot for her to overlook her pride and ask for help from anyone.

"Yeah, it'd be better than always taking the bus or walking when I need to see my PO or my shrink or go to Starbucks or the library…at least before the weather turns bad. Maybe I'll just save up and wait until spring," Jenny went on, shrugging.

"Hey, a bike's not a bad idea. We should get another month or two of fall before it gets really cold," Abbie contemplated this and smiled at her sister. She nodded towards Crane, who was leaning against Abbie's car, hands back in his pockets, "Come with us to lunch, then we can stop by the store and check out the bikes."

"Alright!" Jenny grinned and followed her back to the car.

"Well, first we have to stop at CVS and get some acetone for Crane." Abbie said mostly to herself as she unlocked the car. Her whole life had been turned upside down and mixed around since Ichabod Crane had arrived and, shortly thereafter, her sister had come back into her life. Those two were quite a handful, even when they weren't battling the forces of evil, but, Abbie realized, she wouldn't trade it for the world.

Jenny had her hand on the door handle. She turned around to see Ichabod looking at her knowingly.

He leaned in close and said softly, "Whether or not you are ready to admit it," he paused dramatically then said slowly, "I know your secret."

With that he curtly opened the passenger side door and took his accustomed seat beside Abbie.


End file.
